Nothing But An Ocean
by Marprelate
Summary: Phaedra Marvolo Riddle will tell her son the truth. A "Tom's Mother" fic.


Disclaimer: Everything belongs to JK Rowling. Quotes in between lines from Racine's "Phaedra".

* * *

**:Nothing But An Ocean:**

* * *

I, only I, would have revealed to you  
The subtle windings of the labyrinth.

I am Phaedra, I said, and Thomas raised an eyebrow. _Would that be Euripides or Racine?_ he asked.

I said Marvolo.

Thomas' desire seemed to wane as the child within me grew. I had known to expect that, but it is possible to expect and yet be disappointed. I prepared myself, hoped and planned. But the day I knew for certain that my child would possess a magic as powerful as that of any of his Marvolo forefathers, I decided not to bind his life to my lies. And so I went to find Thomas and tell him my secret.

My grandmother Aerope often spoke of love as a weapon exclusively female. The female body, in comparison with the male form, is more beautiful even to our own eyes, she told me. I believed it, but unwillingly. I was brought up to be a man. It was never my place in the world to be solely a good wife and mother to someone, though I was meant to fulfil my duties in that respect in due time. Primarily, I was Helios Marvolo's heir, and I was to take his place in the world.

But Aerope's words returned to me as I went to Thomas, and realised that there is a magic in certain things that belongs to folk regardless of their blood. Poetry, dance, the human voice raised in song; and the thread connecting all the unspoken magics in the world. Desire. There was no spell a wand could replicate that would cause a man's eyes to look as Thomas' did when I touched him, and I thought that a woman's love was like nothing else in the world but an ocean. People said, even to me sometimes, that men were made for dominance (and that was why I was taught to be one), but it is not so. There was _this_, this drowning and trapping I saw in Thomas' eyes, and I knew myself as formidable as he.

I am not inclined to disbelieve it, even as his other weapons are held over my head to force me out of his world. It is not my womanliness that has failed me, but the man my father tried to make me into. I should have remembered that in Thomas' world, silence was to me what speech was to him. But I forgot, and have lost both gifts, and both worlds, now.

Still, I regret nothing.

* * *

How all her wishes war among themselves!

* * *

There are questions to be asked, and answers to be given, but neither my head nor my heart will accommodate them at present. My self is somewhat better off than my soul, for the shelter has provided me with warmth, sustenance, food for two. Eat for the child, they say. Even at home they say that. 

"Where is home?" the nurse asks.

"Wiltshire." The finest estate in Wizarding England. "Then Oxford, Paris. London. Now here."

"Lor' love you," the nurse says. "Speak some French, then?"

"I do." Greek, Hebrew, Mermish, Gnomish, and more. I spoke more languages than any witch or wizard my age; at least, that was a probability my father considered a fact. It is true, is it not, that men everywhere are willing to deal only in certainty and proof, and are unwilling at best and intolerant at worst of a truth that does not coincide with their own?

Once I, like the rest of the wizarding world, would have suffered agonies before questioning Helios Marvolo, but now the feeling persists that I know more than he.

"Good evening, Phaedra."

"Mrs. Granger."

"Mistress Granger 'ere knows some French herself, don't ye, ma'am?"

The lady of the house is modest and careful with her knowledge. The artfulness of her eyes puts me in mind of the subtlety our folk use in shielding ourselves from the the unmagical.

"Only what little I have out of books, Mary. Don't mislead Phaedra." It is only she out of all who says my name as I see it in my mind. To her, named Helen, it seems not strange or unreal. Mary the nurse calls me Fedruh.

It has come to pass that poor, plain Helen Granger and her stealthy country wives' wisdom serve me in stead of the care of the best Healers of Britain. I have almost grown accustomed to thinking that it is enough. Once I hoped for an equal exchange, the best of the unmagical world – and for love of Thomas it seemed great indeed – for the best I had left behind. Mrs. Granger is gracious, and good to me. To other poor women, too. Some of them come to her unmarried and yet unadvanced, and she aids them with hooks and herbs, or so I have heard.

"Do you feel any better?"

"Much, thank you. Your tea helped me greatly."

"Good," she says and pats my hand. I will it to stay still.

"Is something wrong?"

I would hardly know where to begin. "Nothing apart from the obvious, ma'am."

"Oh, Phaedra." Sympathy; I have never had more than a passing acquaintance with it. "You mustn't trouble yourself more. What's in the past is gone; you have a future to look forward to."

"Do I?"

I am unfamiliar with the terms and conditions of motherhood, having never known my own mother, and doubt wars with decision in my mind. I will be the best mother of any child; I will not fail him. I will not disappoint him. But I cannot help being afraid.

Give me my wand, I had said to my father across the threshold of our house, and Helios Marvolo deigned not to say a word in acknowledgement or accord. There was only a snap. Ten and a half inches, holly with a core of dragon heartstring.

"Did you," she asks hesitantly, "want the child?"

"Yes, I suppose I did."

And Thomas had wanted with me, in his own quiet way. We were both happy. For Thomas I had learned to think of inequality as mere disparity. I had loved him as he was, for his mind, for the voice in which he read poetry - _had we but world enough and time_ - for the hands that played his violin as though upon my very being, and I assumed his love was equal, his understanding adequate. But I misjudged him. Muggles indeed, all those who are frightened by the power of other hands, and Thomas proved himself to be no better than those we shield ourselves from.

What have you done to me, he asked in desolate anger. What have you done, Phaedra.

He thought I bewitched him into love. How could I say in honesty I did not?

"Dwell on that, then, Phaedra, for its sake. Any day now," says Helen Granger.

I am not powerless. Any day now.

* * *

And I will not regret what I have done,  
If you -  
Will cease to vex me with reproaches, and  
Your vain assistance will not try to fan  
The last faint flicker still alight in me.

* * *

When my son is born Helen Granger begs me to write my family to take care of him. "It cannot harm you to try." 

Nothing can, anymore. Aerope once told me that in the warlock John Dee's time, a woman's privates were called _nothing_ by common men. To nothing is where I will return.

"Can you not take him?"

"Oh, Phaedra, if I could, don't you think I would?"

"Well, then. He will have people to care for him. In time."

"Alright, love. Hush, now, you're tiring."

"You cannot help me, ma'am."

I should not have said it, for Helen Granger prepares a lie to comfort me. It is bitter to think of leaving my son, leaving him – but I will not leave him with nothing – he is my desire, clothed in my flesh and blood. He will have my life, and my name, and for one so small, it will be enough.

"Marvolo?"

"It was my maiden name."

"Thomas Marvolo Riddle. Little Tom."

Little Tom, who shall speak in riddles. And solve them, perhaps. I shall write him a letter, and be truthful with him. I shall tell him he came from nothing, and that nothing has power. And I shall will him to live with the knowledge, and use it to his advantage. I will say I have learnt that to be right or wrong one has only to change sides, but that to be complete in oneself is to trick the agony of being, and to desire as I have desired, is to eat death like so much air.

I shall tell him not to think of me as a sacrifice. I am not Iphigeneia, nor Antigone. I am Phaedra. And I regret nothing.

* * *

My Lord, recall how oft the Queen complained.  
Infamous love gave rise to all her hate... 

:end:


End file.
